From humble homes to five- star hospitality
By Kumudini Hettiarachchi
Confident and smiling, they move about the restaurants in a five-star hotel, attentive to the needs of guests like they've been doing it all their lives. Just a few months ago, they were in their humble homes in villages in remote corners of Sri Lanka desperately wondering what they were going to do with their young lives.
What has brought about the change and given them a chance in a lifetime?
"It is a completely new life for us. A break that will help us achieve something in life. A better future for us and also our families," says Jeewanthi Adhikari, 21 from Bellankadawela, Thambuttegama in the Anuradhapura district.
Two weeks into the job as a stewardess at the Navaratne restaurant at Hotel Taj Samudra, she recalls life at home as “tough”. Her father is a farmer and with a younger sibling still in school, life is not that easy. "I applied for many jobs but was rejected regularly. Then came this. I was terrified at the interview and when I got the job I was overjoyed."
With a Rs. 1,000 allowance and meals thrown in as a trainee, she is well on the way to establishing herself in a career in the hospitality industry. The National Apprenticeship Board through which they have been recruited also pays them Rs. 600 as a monthly allowance.
"I want to learn the ropes and rise within this hotel. Later I would like to go abroad," says 22-year-old Charitha Sankalpa from Sooriyawewa in the south. His father too is a farmer and there was no life beyond the village for him until he got a "million in one" chance.
What is the common link not only between Jeewanthi and Charitha but also others like Neville Koch and Gratiaen Buddhika at the Taj Samudra and Iranganie Herath and Jeeva Kumudini working at the Holiday Inn, across the road ?
They are all from Mahaweli areas and the third generation of farmers who were settled under the Accelerated Mahaweli Scheme launched in the late seventies.
"We are trying to provide different training programmes through our centres to these third generation Mahaweli settlers so that they can move out of the field to a different kind of job. Farmers in Mahaweli areas have large families. I am not saying that all should find other jobs but at least one from each family should be able to do something else to bring about some variety in their lives," explains Shanthini Kongahage, Director, Women's Development of the Mahaweli Authority and also of Mahaweli Venture Capital Company (Pvt) Ltd.
The Mahaweli settlers, around 131,000 at the time the project was launched are unique, she says, adding that they had to overcome many difficulties and start life afresh in those areas. "These farmer men and women had to build new homes, go to new temples, send their children to new schools and get used to a different life away from their original villages. So I felt that the Mahaweli Authority, though it has been conducting many training programmes including English lessons for the youth, needed to take the responsibility of finding them gainful employment."
That's how she began the trend of requesting the hotel industry to give these youth a chance. The first batch was interviewed about seven months ago and several offered jobs. "Now youth from Mahaweli areas are in five-star hotels such as the Taj and JAIC Hilton and also doing various jobs at Holiday Inn and hotels run by the Jetwing Group. They are doing well," she says proudly, adding that she is ever grateful to these organizations for giving rural youth such a rare opportunity. The hospitality industry has seen the entry of about 80-100 such rural youth from the Mahaweli areas.
Dedicated and good, was the verdict of the Taj Samudra Personnel Manageress, Pushpika Goonetilleke about the Mahaweli youth recruited by them. "We take them on as trainees through the National Apprenticeship Board. They are also given English language classes. After a year's training we assess them and depending on their capabilities, absorb them.”
At Holiday Inn, we meet Iranganie and Jeeva for a quick chat while they are cleaning rooms on the seventh floor. Both from the interior of Eppawala, a village called Rattota, they consider themselves very lucky that they have got jobs in housekeeping at the same hotel.
Iranganie has many a burden to contend with because her younger brother has fallen on "bad times". But having a brand new job, which is just 15 days old, she is ready to face any challenge life throws at her. "Sampurnayenma aluth jeevithayak patan aran thiyenne" (I have started a completely new life), she says while Jeeva nods in agreement.
The only problem they face at the moment is the congested lodgings they have found on their own in Slave Island. "We share a small room with about 12 others and have only a place to put a mat and keep our things close by. Even the single toilet has to be shared with the others and the five members of the family running the boarding," they say, adding that Rs. 900 each has to be paid up every month from the allowance of Rs 2,100 they get from the hotel. But they see only the silver lining, quickly adding that they have the advantage of bathing and using the other facilities at the hotel.
What of the initial fears and obstacles they faced in their new life in Colombo, so far away from home?
"The first few days I could never find my way inside the hotel," says Jeewanthi laughing that she was 10 minutes late reporting to duty because she was going round and round in a maze of corridors. The kitchen staff too had some clean fun at her expense by telling her to go through this door and that but now she's wise to all this. "You must always take the doors on the left," she has learned.
For the two girls at Holiday Inn, they want to learn all they can as soon as possible even foregoing their off-days. "But the management is insisting that we must take our off-days. So we are hoping to go home this weekend," says Iranganie.
The standard time for cleaning a room is 20 minutes. Iranganie and Jeeva are quick learners. They do their jobs well and keep to the time spot on. They are neat and tidy. This can hardly be said of the people we recruit from Colombo, laments Holiday Inn's Executive Housekeeper Devika Perera.
Proof enough that Mahweli Authority Director Shanthini Kongahage's gamble has paid off. Rural youth are equal or better if only they are given a chance and a helping hand.
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